Post by StevePulaski on Jun 23, 2016 12:16:57 GMT -5
Autism in Love (2015)
Directed by: Matt Fuller
Rating: ★★½
Directed by: Matt Fuller
Rating: ★★½
"I wish I could've been a normal person," Lenny, an autistic man in his mid-twenties, tells his mother, whom he has lived with all his life. He later tells the camera that he could've been in college right now, holding down a job, making money, and feeling worthy of a place in society, but instead, spends most of his days slouched on his bed, lonesome, playing video games, and hopelessly wishing for some kind of companionship, particularly from a woman. His mother helps him the best she can, and to her credit, prompts him in wonderful conversations about what he looks for in a woman and how he'd go about maintaining a relationship.
Lenny goes on to say, however, that if he found a woman he liked a lot, he still couldn't be with her if she was smarter or made more money than him. His viewpoint obviously stems from feeling inferior or inadequate his entire life when compared to his classmates and colleagues. Lenny comments about how he always feels intimidated and fearful of his image when he walks outside his house every day. He can simply feel the inferiority wash over him in a wave of insecurities.
He is just one of four stories profiled in Matt Fuller's documentary Autism in Love, available to watch via Netflix's Watch Instant streaming service, which concerns four autistic souls searching for romance and love. Dating and commitment in the age of the internet and modern technology has become nothing but harder to find, and when somebody is autistic, it can be a nightmare to find someone to even take them seriously let alone want to commit to a serious, romantic, and sexual relationship.
The very grounds of basic autism is defined as a person having difficulty communicating and forming relationships, so on that note, forming a romantic relationship is ostensibly counter-intuitive. One of Fuller's subjects proves, however, that is can happen and work. The couple is Dave and Lindsey, who have been together for eight years, with Dave being autistic. In one scene, we see Dave's love for The Weather Channel, as he sits in his rocker absorbing all of it while Lindsey explains that she feels an important, sentimental necklace she wears diverts all the attention from her body to that piece of jewelry. In the process of explaining herself, Dave asks her to keep quiet so he can hear the weather report - again.
Stephen, on the other hand, is a middle-aged autistic man, living with his parents and boasting intelligence that he often exercises while watching Jeopardy! with his folks. He has been married to a woman named Gita for almost two decades, but when terminal illness turns her life around, he needs to care for her in a way that she has long cared for him, all while battling his own social difficulties and anxiety.
Fuller's documentary will likely be an emotional one if you or someone you know is autistic. It's a well-done film in the sense that, in seventy minutes, it gives you a glimpse into what it means to feel or be perceived as "forever alone," or the emotional weight autism takes on one's confidence and self-esteem. Because it has to focus on a barrage of stories, however, in such little time, it unfortunately becomes muddled in what it wants you to take away from these people, in addition to failing to spend enough time with these characters to truly get to know them beyond a quick glimpse.
However, Lenny winds up having the most telling line in the entire film, which cleanly and directly sums up his thoughts on being an autistic man - "if I had the choice to either be a normal man or an autistic man with a million dollars, I'd be a normal man."
Directed by: Matt Fuller.